As of November 30, the Kenai Peninsula’s warm winter has beat the previous record for days with temperatures above zero.
Joe Wegman with NOAA said the records are kept by the month but as of November 30, Soldotna has had 266 above zero and Kenai is at 319.
We asked him what is creating these warm winter temperatures.
Wegman: “Well the pattern so far, first of all we’ve had the Bering Sea water temperatures have generally been above average for the first time this winter, whereas the last seven or eight years they’ve been below average. So when you have warmer than normal water temperatures that’s able to warm up the air above it so generally just warmer air in the vicinity of southcentral Alaska has been allowing for generally warmer temperatures.”
The lowest temperature for Soldotna in 2014 was February 12, at -13 degrees F and Kenai’s was February 11 and 12 with both of those days getting down to -5 degrees F.
Soldotna’s second longest above zero stretch was from April 1-November 3, 2009 with 216 days and Kenai’s was 300 days from February 17- December 13, 1983.